EDGE OF PARADISE
“The Unknown”
Album Review by Iron Mathew

9/10

Edge Of Paradise are a metal band from the USA, founded by singer Margarita Monet and guitarist Dave Bates. The band released their debut album ‘Mask’ in 2012, and their sophomore album ‘Immortal Waltz’ in 2015, Signing to Frontiers Music, Edge Of Paradise released their third album ‘Universe’ in 2019, supporting Finnish metallers Sonata Arctica on the bands tour of Europe later that year. With touring plans for 2020 sidelined due to the global COVID-19 pandemic, the band set about writing songs for their fourth album…

…’The Unknown’, released in 2021. Blending the sounds of heavy metal, symphonic metal, and hard rock, Edge Of Paradise deliver a heavy hitting forty minutes of punchy and sonically infectious metal. The bands music covers a wide spectrum, appealing to a huge army of fans with varying tastes. The new album is given life with the heavy foot stomper ‘Digital Paradise’ – a menacing yet catchy and highly enticing opening salvo. The sensuous vocals of lead singer Margarita are matched by the extent of her range, soaring from a gritty rasp to the heights of symphonic metal. Energy levels are kicked up a notch with ‘My Method Your Madness’, a hearty gallop of traditionally fuelled metal. The chorus is infectious and sing a long-able, with ‘My Method Your Madness’ striding majestically at the heavier end of the heavy metal genre.

A short tension filled intro brings ‘Tidal Wave’ to the fore, adopting a mid tempo thunder stomp as it continues the majestic stride of the previous song – retaining the catchy style chorus too. All power and oomph is dropped in favour of a ballad style intro for the title song ‘The Unknown’. All mellow and soulful, ‘The Unknown’ (the song) builds and builds until wham and bam, you’re hit with a savagely heavy barrage of thunder. The raw energy oozing from ‘The Unknown’ (the song) is enough to power a couple of small towns! Blending ballad and hymn like tendencies, ‘Believe’ is a mellow yet powerful lighters in the air moment. And though the pace is still subdued, the energy isn’t – ‘Believe’ crackling and fizzing like it’s bursting to explode.

A little bit of pace returns in the shape of ‘False Idols’, an up tempo, mid paced energetic foot stomp – the symphonic power metal side of the band coming to the fore. Each and every song heard so far has been one hundred percent infectious, with the energy levels perilously high. The aggressively titled ‘You Touch You Die’ is more up front and in your face than anything that has gone before. However, the addictive nature of ‘You Touch You Die’ is off the scale – and with a little of the groove metal style tucked in there too, you won’t be able to stop your feet from stomping, your head from nodding hard, and a broad smile from covering your whole face!

The menacing nature of earlier makes a return for ‘One Last Time’ – a sultry vocal delivery tickling your aural senses, before a wall of thunder claps so loudly you’re jolted backwards! And what, from the surface, may seem like a ballad, is in reality a heavy hitter that’s gonna leave some form of bruising. The hard rocking foot stomping style of metal makes its emphatic presence felt as ‘Leaving Earth’ takes off. Another soaring vocal performance from Margarita places ‘Leaving Earth’ firmly in the symphonic power metal genre – right in the mid paced middle! The album closes with another meld of the ballad and hymn like styles – ‘Bound To The Rhythm’ featuring the sexiest vocal performance of the entire album, literally giving me goose bumps! Mainly because Margarita sounds a lot like my all time metal love, the “queen of metal” herself, the iconic, the legendary, the beautiful, Doro Pesch. What a corker to round off a very good album.

Overall, a thundering and energetic romp of metal, featuring large doses of symphonic power metal and hard rock.

TRACKLIST

Digital Paradise
My Method Your Madness
Tidal Wave
The Unknown
Believe
False Idols
You Touch You Die
One Last Time
Leaving Earth
Bound To The Rhythm

http://www.edgeofparadiseband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/EdgeOfParadiseBand

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